The Difference Of One

Often you read the title of a book initially unaware of its specific content.  And, even though the punctuation does not indicate a question, you have questions.  You are also pondering probable answers to those questions.

We lost John Robert Lewis on July 17, 2020.  He was a man who never sought it, but was wrapped in a mantle of light and honor for his lifetime of accomplishments.  Certainly, there must be a lengthy list of truths to follow the first five words in this title.  Possibilities were whirling through my mind.   Because Of You, John Lewis: The True Story Of A Remarkable Friendship (Scholastic Press, June 7, 2022) written by Andrea Davis Pinkney with illustrations by Keith Henry Brown supplies us with a story each generation wishes for the next.  We wish for the world to be a better place for all and we wish for those who follow us to continue working toward that better place.

His name is as bright as the dawn filled with stars.

Tybre Faw.

Tybre Faw has a wish as radiant as his name.  He wants to meet Congressman John Lewis and shake his hand.  Hailing from Johnson City, Tennessee, Tybre has been schooled by his grandmothers and the Black Lives Matter movement.  This is a child filled with purpose and hope.

Upon first learning about John Lewis, Tybre reads all he can about this friend of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  He reads about his youth as a sharecropper's son and preaching to his family's chickens.  He reads how John Lewis wanted to meet Dr. King.

He reads about John Lewis receiving the nickname of 

"Good Trouble". 

He reads about John Lewis's activities during the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.  He reads how John Lewis writes a letter to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, and gets a bus ticket in return.  It is a bus ticket so John Lewis can meet Dr. King.  This is how their friendship begins.  This is how they both give memorable speeches on August 28, 1963 in Washington, DC.  This is why the duo are walking across the Edmund Pettus Bridge on what is now called Bloody Sunday.

After Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s passing, John Lewis knew he needed to keep his friend's endeavors alive.  Each year he marches across the Edmund Pettus Bridge.  This year, 2018, Tybre Faw has persuaded his two grandmothers to make the seven hour drive from Johnson City, Tennessee to Selma, Alabama.  In anticipation, he waits for John Robert Lewis to exit the Brown Chapel AME Church.  He wishes.  He keeps wishing.  He holds a sign thanking the congressman.

A wish comes true.  A hand is grasped.  Words are exchanged.  An invitation is extended.  A walk, together, is made across that famous bridge.  And, again, endeavors are being kept alive.  They live in the words of John Lewis's favorite poem read by Tybre Faw at the congressman's memorial service at Ebenezer Baptist Church.  Keep wishing, children, keep wishing.

Immediately two words come to mind each time this title penned by Andrea Davis Pinkney is read.  They are powerful and poignant.  The poetic sentences weave together the friendship of John Robert Lewis with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and the friendship of John Robert Lewis with Tybre Faw.  Past and present blend with historic accuracy.  An uplifting undercurrent of hope runs through the entire narrative. 

Many times Andrea Davis Pinkney creates an enhanced impact by grouping thoughts and facts together in threes.  These are carefully placed within the text.  She also uses repetition to excellent effect.  When she describes the 1965 march on the Edmund Pettus Bridge and the strength of the relationship between John and Martin, it is stunning.  Here is a passage.

Hearing Martin's words lit a light in John's heart.

They flew straight

to John's wide-open hopes

and tucked themselves

into the deepest pockets of his understanding.

I want to meet that clergyman.

I want to shake his hand.

I want to tell Martin Luther King, Jr.

             exactly who I am.

                                    Me. John Robert.

On the front, right side, of the matching dust jacket and book case, we see John Robert Lewis standing tall, yet humbly, above a depiction of one of the commemorative marches across the Edmund Pettus Bridge.  In front of them is Tybre Faw, holding the sign he carried as he waited outside the church in hopes of meeting John Lewis.  To the left of the spine, on the back, is an image extending to the flap edge.  It is a bird's eye view of thousands of marchers crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge.  The bridge is shown right to left across the lower portion with the city buildings rising in the upper portion.  Water and trees fill the area between the two.  In the sky is a John Lewis quote:

"Never, ever be afraid to make some noise and

get in good trouble, necessary trouble.

The opening and closing endpapers are in a muted orange.  On the title page, there are a limited number of colors.  The full-page image presents a night with a full moon shining over the Edmund Pettus Bridge, now nearly empty except for a few vehicles.

Each of the double-page pictures rendered by Keith Henry Brown

primarily with watercolor and quill pen with black ink on smooth Bristol and D'Arches cold-pressed 140 pound paper, and then rendered digitally

elevates the text as well as supplies readers with a pictorial insight into history, then and now.  The portraits of Tybre, John, and Martin are thoughtful, meaningful, and moving.  The watercolor washes fashion a marvelous mix of light and shadow.  The black ink lines draw our eyes to the people and their reflected personalities.  

Often, Keith Henry Brown will place the people in a setting with relevant buildings in the background as well as a historical event.  If there are other people present, he will have them fade into the background, giving them a solid color while our attention is drawn to the main people in full color. He will also give insight into what the people might be thinking or reading.

One of my many favorite illustrations is a wash of red, blue, and green, all blending into a pleasing whole.  Bold, black lines outline the lower half of Tybre's legs on the day he met John Lewis.  His pants are cuffed at the bottom and a bit longer.  Tybre's new shoes are tied tight with laces. His feet are walking, walking forward, as his friend John Lewis would want him to do.

The eloquent words and radiant images in Because Of You, John Lewis: The True Story Of A Remarkable Friendship written by Andrea Davis Pinkney with artwork by Keith Henry Brown afford readers with a deeply personal and memorable portrait of John Robert Lewis and his friends Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Tybre Faw.  It is a story spanning decades and it continues to this day.  At the close of the book are two pages titled Two Journeys. One Dream.  These are followed by two pages dedicated to a Time Line Of The Life of Rep. John Lewis.  There is a half page of sources and further reading. One page showcases black and white photographs during the civil rights movement.  On the opposite page are color photographs of John Lewis and of John Lewis and Tybre.  The entire poem Invictus by William Ernest Henley is printed with these pictures.  I cannot imagine a personal or professional collection without a copy or two of this title.

To learn more about Keith Henry Brown and his other work, please access his website by following the link attached to his name. (For some reason, I am currently unable to link to the stated website for Andrea Davis Pinkney.)  Andrea Davis Pinkney has accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.  Keith Henry Brown has accounts on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.  On the Scholastic Reads Podcast John Robert Lewis is honored.  Andrea Davis Pinkney is present discussing this book as well as U. S. Representative Nikema Williams with her memories of Congressman Lewis.

Speak! Keep Speaking!

For those who have strongly aligned their lives with the preservation and protection of animals, it says a great deal about the compassion they have in their hearts for all lives.  Animals are much more adaptable to our presence than we are to their occupancy in shared spaces.  They hear and understand us more than we know.  What is continuously and abundantly clear is we need each other.

On November 3, 2016 The New York Times announced its Best Illustrated Children's Books of 2016.  Of the ten chosen titles one eloquently presents the young life of a practicing congressman in the United States House of Representatives.  Preaching To The Chickens: The Story of young John Lewis (Nancy Paulsen Books, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, October 11, 2016) written by Jabari Asim with illustrations by E. B. Lewis will lift your spirits and make your soul sing.

Little John Lewis loved the spring.  He loved it not only because it was the time when the whole world came alive, but also because it was the season of the chicks.

John concurred with Mother Nature; spring was just right for new life.  His family relied on their strong faith in God and in working hard on their farm.  And make no mistake; the work was hard all day long, all year long.  His father turned the earth with a mule-drawn plow.  His mother washed their clothes and cooked food she grew over open fires outside.

John's main responsibility was to care for their sixty or so chickens.  When he feed them each morning they clucked a response. John believed they were thanking him.  They gathered around him like chicks around a mother hen.  He in turn would softly chat with them about God's messages to his children, all living things.

Other than his time with the chickens, John truly relished Sundays and time spent at church.  When the words and music of hymns surrounded him, the boy felt wrapped in pure contentment.  The messages he heard there so moved him, he started preaching to the members of his feathered flock.  Each one was an important individual to him.  

When a traveling trader wanted one of the chickens under John's care, he offered alternative solutions which his parents accepted.  More than once he saved his chickens' lives with the Gospel as his guide.  John believed practice made perfect.  He never stopped then and he has not stopped now.

On June 22, 2016 certain members of Congress refused to leave the House floor until an important vote was taken on gun control legislation.  One of those members was John Lewis.  Author Jabari Asim has given readers relevant insights into the early life of this very public figure who has been a champion for civil rights.  It's important he incorporates dialogue within the narrative making our reading experience more intimate.  It's meaningful he includes John naming each chicken thus giving value to their lives.  We can't help but feel a kinship to this man who is a beacon for those who need a light the most. We can't help but understand how a higher principle paves his path.  Here is a passage from this title.

When the hen called Big Belle fell into the well and got stuck, John was determined to save her. He filled a basket with bread crumbs, and when he lowered it down, she climbed in and was pulled to safety.

"God makes miracles every day," John preached.

Last week when I read this book aloud to a classroom of third grade students you could have heard a pin drop when they first saw the matching dust jacket and book case, rendered, as are all the illustrations, in watercolor and gouache by E. B. Lewis.  Look carefully at the realistic depiction of the boy and his chickens and the flow of the brush strokes.  This image is fully animated.  To the left, on the back, a group of chickens, shadows playing along with ground, by the light and their movement, are accompanied by opening text from the book.

A deep dark forest green covers the opening and closing endpapers.  Beneath the text on the title page in pools of shadow several hens and chicks move and stand frozen in time or perhaps listening to a young preacher. Across the verso and dedication pages is the landscape of the farm with the rows of cotton, young and green, the home and other buildings. 

All of the illustrations span two pages with the exception of two.  Their beauty strikes all your sensory chords; you can feel the sun shining on the boy's face, you can hear the gently clucking of the chickens and peeping of the chicks, you understand the muscle aches, tiredness and determination of the boy's parents, and you can see those chickens gathering to hear John's words.  The tenderness growing in this boy for these chickens is evident in his facial expressions.  You know he will become a man who listens to everyone and who listens to him. You know he will become a man who has deep affection for those who need him to step forward on their behalf.

One of my favorite illustrations is of John seated, cross-legged, on the ground outside the chicken coop.  We are close to him in this image. The chickens are gathered around him. He is cradling one in his arms.  A slight smile plays around his mouth. (I know this feeling when you believe you are one with an animal or animals in your life.  It is an unforgettable sensation, a gift.)

Preaching To The Chickens: The story of young John Lewis written by Jabari Asim with illustrations by E. B. Lewis is a remarkable portrait in words showcased with luminous illustrations.  This is reminder of how our children can grow to be the finest our country has to offer us and the world.  It is a tribute to John Lewis and to all those who endeavor to raise themselves up in service to others.  Please take a moment to read the Author's Note on the final page.

To learn more about Jabari Asim and his other work, please follow the link attached to his name to access his website. You can learn more about E. B. Lewis and his work by going to his website through the link attached to his name.  Julie Danielson, author, reviewer and blogger, highlights some of E. B. Lewis's images from this title at Seven Impossible Things Before Breakfast including one of my favorites.

Be sure to visit educator Alyson Beecher's blog, Kid Lit Frenzy, to see other titles selected by bloggers participating in the 2016 Nonfiction Picture Book Challenge.